


Tenderest touch leaves the darkest of marks

by det395



Series: The hardest of hearts [1]
Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Angst, Blood, Hannibal Lecter Loves Will Graham, M/M, Mentions of Suicide, Mutual Pining, Non-Graphic Violence, Prison, Unresolved Romantic Tension, Will is a Mess, and also loves to bother the hell out of him, love that that's a tag already
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-23
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:47:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28252662
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/det395/pseuds/det395
Summary: Will goes to the BSHCI to consult on the Red Dragon case and finds Hannibal on the wrong side of his cell, covered in blood.Instead of escaping, Hannibal pulls Will into the cell with him.
Relationships: Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Series: The hardest of hearts [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2093676
Comments: 64
Kudos: 471





	Tenderest touch leaves the darkest of marks

Will swears he hears the sound of a cell gate latching behind him. And then sees the lights all dim and the walls close in on him. He turns back to look but it’s the same old entrance, and he’s still in the foyer of the Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane. 

Chills run down his spine when he enters this building. He has to remind himself that they’re going to let him out of here at the end of the night. 

It’s unnervingly quiet as he checks in. But then again, he’s not usually here at nighttime, not on this side of the bars. He remembers the nights when he was locked away. Sometimes he managed to convince himself there wasn’t a single other person in the building. That the snores he heard were the guttural snort of a large stag.

The guard with the patchy mustache lets him skip the sign-in process and sends him off with a cordial nod. He’s seen him here enough.

It brings back memories he doesn’t want to acknowledge, but he couldn’t quite convince himself to keep driving this time. His phone-time with Molly came and went with an apologetic text. 

Perhaps this is just a way to stave off the nightmares for a while longer. It doesn’t matter. The faster he can catch the Red Dragon, the faster he can leave and the faster he can empty his brain. He’ll stop feeling like pieces of himself are falling off and settling on the floor outside of Hannibal’s cell. He’ll find a semblance of peace he couldn’t have otherwise without seeing Hannibal behind that sturdy glass wall.

The only sound he can hear is his own heels tapping on the floor. It’s dim and still. He looks over his shoulder and makes a mental note to ask Alana if she checks whether or not her guards are slacking off in the night.

He adjusts his coat and the folder under his arm and pushes open the door to Hannibal’s ward. As soon as he steps inside, he drops them both. Papers fly out and pens clatter along the floor. After a moment the door clicks shut behind him and makes him flinch.

Hannibal. Hannibal only a few feet away, far too close, unobscured by the reflection in the glass. Hannibal turning to face him, and blood. A lot of blood. Drenching the front of his jumpsuit, smeared down his neck, plastered around his mouth, and dripping from his fingertips.

On the wrong side of his cell wall.

“Oh. Will.” He sounds breathless. His smile is enamoured and reveals the blood staining between his teeth.

“Wh— _why?_ ” Will chokes out, looking at the scene in front of him.

Will’s eyes track to the bodies piled up in the cell, two guards, with an ocean of blood flowing below them. The cell door is wide open.

“I just wanted to step out for a moment. There’s a window down the hall that looks out upon the woods to the East.”

Will gawks at him. Hannibal’s expression is a strange mix between smug and amused.

“Would you like to come for the stroll with me?” Hannibal asks.

Will brushes his thumb against the lump in his pocket, he still has his phone, and his gun strapped on the other side. 

“Who would you like to call? Jack? Alana?”

“Is this really worth it? Alana’s going to make life hell for you if you’re captured again.”

Hannibal sighs and looks to the side. “The new guards weren’t very nice.”

Will’s hand twitches, tapping his fingers together in rapid succession down by his side. It all runs together in his head, what he should do, what he could do, and all the while, he can’t get it out of his mind that cameras and microphones are watching him hesitate this decision.

His breath has picked up so much that it’s difficult to speak.

“What are you aiming for here? What do you want?”

“Would you believe me if I told you this just happened? Funny how events draw together, like a melody,” Hannibal says. 

“No, I really don’t believe that.”

“Hm,” Hannibal says. His upper lip stretches where he tongues at the blood on his teeth, sucking and pulling in his cheeks. Will looks away, focuses his eyes on the bodies in the cell.

And he sees a flash of movement. His eyes track the guards trembling movements. Fuck. It makes it so much more complicated that one of them is _alive—_ someone to save. 

Hannibal follows his gaze just in time to hear the buzz of the radio as the guard manages to press down the button and wheeze before his head drops down again.

Will feels Hannibal’s anger like a tremble over his body, even though Hannibal stays completely still. The focused glare in his eyes is hard to look away from. Will bites down the urge to call him an idiot for not checking if the guards were truly dead, but he reckons Hannibal would have checked if he had truly cared.

If he knew Will was going to show up.

They stand still and listen to voices coming through the radio, asking for a response with increasing impatience. It won’t be long before guards arrive in person now. 

“You know they’re going to shoot me on sight,” Hannibal says. Will does know, very well. No one wants to see a monster on the wrong side of the glass.

“Get back in then, and they won’t have to,” Will says through clenched teeth.

“You’d like me to?”

“Yes, I’d like you to.”

“Are you going to lock the door behind me yourself? Are you going to revel in the feeling of not just symbolically, but also physically capturing me?”

“This isn’t some kind of power play.”

“I recall you once telling me there can be no decisive victory when it comes to the two of us.”

“That isn’t what this is about.”

“You are scared for my well being, then?”

“You should worry about your own well being. I don’t recall you being suicidal.”

“Suicide is the enemy.”

“Then get back in the cage. Don’t be an idiot, Doctor Lecter.”

“Does an intelligent person walk into their own prison cell?”

“If he’s going to get shot, then yes.”

“And if I am curious about what will happen?”

“You know what happened to the cat.”

“You aren’t aware of the end of the nursery rhyme? Where is my satisfaction?”

Will glares at him and steps forward.

“Are you going to make me go? Drag me in there yourself?” Hannibal asks.

“Jesus fucking Christ, just go back in.”

Hannibal's head tilts slightly, and it may as well be a shrug. 

“Hannibal. Go back in,” Will demands, stepping forward once more. 

Hannibal grins at him. In the distance, Will can hear hurried footsteps coming near.

“Please,” Will says, but Hannibal stays still. The tension builds up in Will’s shoulders, and he’s just about to push Hannibal into the cell his damn self. 

The footsteps are too close. He can hear them. Far too close. They're _here._

Will doesn’t know what he’s doing when he spins on his heels and stands in front of Hannibal to yell, “DON’T SHOOT!”

Palms forward and body angled to cover Hannibal from the door, Will watches the terrified hesitation of three guards, cautiously filing into the room gun first. They look back and forth at each other.

He fishes his badge out of his pocket. “I’m Will Graham, and I work for the FBI. Don’t shoot him if you don’t need to, okay? We don’t need to complicate things. He’s going to get back in his cell, and then we’ll sort things out. _Right_ , Doctor Lecter?”  
  


Hannibal breathes out behind him and only Will can tell it’s a laugh.

“Mr. Graham,” the first guard says, shifting his weight and staring down the barrel of his gun. He’s tall, capable-looking. “I need to recommend you step away from him.”

Will peers half over his shoulder until he can see Hannibal’s silhouette in his periphery. “Doctor Lecter, you’re going to put your hands up and walk backward now, slowly, and enter the cell. Do you really want to die getting _shot?_ Walk, now.”

Looking to make sure the guards are complying, Will takes a hopeful step back and bumps right into solid warmth. He sucks in a breath.

“Are you going to protect me the entire way?” Hannibal asks, low against the back of his ear.

“Hannibal,” Will warns. He doesn’t take his eyes off the guards, who are staring at him with so much shock that he begins to feel self-conscious. 

Hannibal breathes in his smell, rustling his hair, and Will’s throat catches. He stares wide-eyed at the guards to see if they’ve noticed.

“If you say I must, then we’ll go,” Hannibal says. Two large hands settle firmly on either side of Will’s ribs and gently pull him back. Will grabs onto his wrists and tries weakly to pull away but Hannibal holds tighter.

Will shakes his head. “Don’t, H—”

“Don’t you want me caged?”

Will stops himself from shaking his head and takes a stumbling step backward when he’s yanked, almost stepping on Hannibal’s toes. Hands squeeze at his waist and pull him back, not forceful but not gentle either. 

He can surrender or he can fight, and the fight won't be pretty with three guns and three incompetent guards staring at him. The first step is to get Hannibal restrained from hurting anyone else. He resigns himself to Hannibal’s stubbornness, and with a wince at his bad decision-making, he walks backward.

The guards close in slowly, uncertainty laced on all of their faces. Hannibal guides him back further and further until Will sees the other side of the glass cell appear in front of his eyes.

A guard hurries forward and slams the gate closed with a loud clang. He’s the one with the patchy mustache from reception.

The noise of the gate continues to ring in Will’s ears, and he stares at the lock helplessly. He twists out of Hannibal’s grip, where his thumbs have started to rub over his ribs.

“What the hell are you doing?” the tall guard demands, voice echoing around the room. Will jerks his head back at them, but the guard is staring at his coworker.

“The least we can do is stop him from hurting anyone else!”

“What the hell are we supposed to do now?”

“I’ll go call Bloom. You both stand guard if they try to get out again,” says the one from reception before he hurries out of the room, more fear than duty judging by the tremble in his hands. 

Will hears the word _they_ ring through his mind. _They_ might escape. This is already cemented as his cage, too. 

“Mr. Graham, hang tight. We’re calling for further direction and backup,” the tall guard says. He presses his radio close to his mouth and speaks quietly.

Will glares at them for their idiocy, face going red. He knows that no amount of people can tame Hannibal. Not him, least of all, _clearly._ Walking backwards into a lion cage.

“Will, breathe,” Hannibal says from behind. 

Will turns on him and stares accusingly. “What the hell?”

Hannibal’s lip twitches in amusement, pointy teeth brush against his lower lip. “How could I help myself?”

“This isn’t funny, Hannibal. This is so far past fucked up.”

Hannibal tilts his head, a little fond and a little condescending. The smell of their proximity hits Will like a truck, something so utterly familiar under the metallic of blood that it makes him dizzy. His next thought is that no one should be in Hannibal’s arms reach without his straitjacket.

Will backs away, toward the door he so desperately wants to get through. It’s starting to hit him that he’s truly stuck in here, with Hannibal and the sickly smell of fresh corpses for company. His mouth tastes of copper.

“Why, I thought I could give you the tour, though there’s not much to see admittedly. You’ve seen most of my books, some drawings you may recognize. I would offer you some dinner, but whether or not you would accept this invitation, I believe, is made complicated with an audience.”

“How did you get out in the first place?” Will asks.

Hannibal is quiet.

“ _Persuaded_ one to give up the code?”

Hannibal smiles.

“You’re not going to cooperate with letting me out, though, are you?”  
  
“You only just got here.”

“Hannibal!” Will yells, the impatience taking over.

“I’m glad to see we’re on a first-name basis again, at least when you’re not trying to bother me. It never really left your tongue, did it?”

Will puts a hand on the gun at his side. It’s only now that he realizes he never even considered the possibility of letting Hannibal die. 

Hannibal frowns. “You’re right. I really wouldn’t like to die by a gun of all things.”

“You’re fucking crazy. You know that?”

“Oh, Will, you know better than that.”

“I meant it in a derogatory way.”

Hannibal laces his hands behind his back and grins.

Will tunes into the guards talking in not-so hushed voices on the other side of the wall.

“...and what if he stabs him again? That’s on us!” 

“ _He_ went in there. And they look—”

“Shut up. They’re staring at us.”

Will glares at them, and they fall into a tense silence.

Will can’t help but take in the view from the other side of the glass. The dim light, the dark hall leading to nowhere. He catches his reflection and can practically see himself standing on the other side, staring in, Hannibal at his shoulder. It feels like he’s been here before. It feels like he’s been here this entire time.

He turns back to Hannibal and is shocked all over again by the vividness of the blood covering him in the light of the cell. He has to look away from his relentless smile.

He looks at the corpses instead. If the guard isn’t dead, he will be, and he can’t find it in him to bother to check. The only weapon needed was Hannibal’s teeth. He can tell that much immediately. He can see it in his mind, no matter how much he tries not to. The association comes fast, the feeling of a windpipe crunching below his teeth—the hunger. In his mind he enters the scene and fights to find his way back, blinking rapidly.

That isn’t all. Something's catching at his mind about the events beforehand. He sees the straitjacket kicked to the side, the tipped over wheely, a baton rolled away. He turns back and catches the way Hannibal’s posture sags ever so slightly to the side, a hand on his side. He hadn’t noticed before.

“You were defending yourself,” Will says. “At the start, at least.”

“I told you they weren’t very nice guards.”  
  


“Vengeance or annoyance? They have associations with old victims?”

“Brother and friend, I believe.”

“Ah.” Will shifts his weight. “How’d you get out of it?”

“Luck, some might say, or divine retribution, that the brother grabbed hard enough to rip the clasp.”

Will looks around at the scene as it clicks. “You didn’t plan an escape. It just happened,” Will says, raising his eyebrows.

“Just as you happened to walk upon me, sharing the same side of the world again. It’s only fair I’d bring you back here.”

“Can’t keep me in here forever unless you plan to eat me.”

“I suppose.”

Hannibal continues to stand and stare with his hands clasped behind him. He hunches over slightly at the stomach. Will imagines the punches the guards got in before Hannibal got an arm out. In a place where no one would ever see, and Hannibal would never show.

The blood is still untouched on his face. Will accepts that Hannibal is going to continue to wear it proudly. A mask that shows rather than obscures himself, an opportunity to bathe in the liquid of life that he controls. It’s so thick that it barely shows signs of drying.

A million questions that Will can’t speak aloud run through his mind. He leans against the wall and wipes a hand over his face roughly.

It isn’t _impossible_ that Hannibal might kill him again. Not if his emotions are high and unpredictable. Will reckons Hannibal hasn’t had enough of him, though. It’s never enough. There’s always room for one more scar, his skin marked again and again.

“I’ve been rude, haven’t I? What was the reason for your visit, Will?”

“Don’t talk to me,” Will whispers, shaking his head. He leans against the wall and puts his hands over his face, blocking all sight.

The guards will call Alana, Alana will call Jack. He left Jack behind at Quantico, only a short drive from here. He isn’t sure if Alana and Margot are sleeping at Muskrat Farms, or if a new home has less painful memories.

They will likely threaten or bribe Hannibal with his privileges. Whatever language they use, it’s all the same. A few books and a toilet seat for Will’s freedom. Will can easily imagine which one Hannibal finds more amusing.

Perhaps they will shoot Hannibal through the holes in the glass. Tranquilizer, first, if they decide they can risk Will’s life for those few seconds. A number of weapons exist on the guard’s bodies that Hannibal could use, but he doesn't see any hidden on Hannibal's person. He probably rejects guns on principle.

How telling will it be if Hannibal _doesn’t_ try to kill him? The tabloids are already filled with crude rumours that make him feel nauseous to read. He dreads the day they grow mainstream enough that he has to explain himself to Molly of all people. How does he explain that there’s a different kind of violence that stems from the desire to be near?

Will could disarm Hannibal himself. His physical combat training is ingrained into his bones, his strength sustained with house projects. They haven’t fought hand to hand before, though he's sure Hannibal fights dirty. The implications pull him back to earlier dreams and Will knows it won't work. He can’t touch Hannibal like that. He won’t consider how Hannibal would react.

He becomes aware of Hannibal’s presence coming to stand next to him, the slightest bit of heat off his shoulder. Will tries not to tense too much and then tries not to relax too much.

“Planning your escape?” Hannibal asks.

“Don’t.”

“How would you do it if you were truly locked away, I wonder? I imagine a deception similar to Edmond Dantes. You as well would return to the world to find revenge, wouldn’t you? Oh how you would soar, delivering exactly what each acquaintance deserves, flourishing in your mark on the world. How goodness and evil play on each other, setting the scales just right. All the treasures would surely be yours, victorious. The past may haunt but justice does more than heal, doesn’t it Will?”

Will sighs in annoyance and keeps his eyes shut. He can feel Hannibal’s gaze either way.

“I mustn’t share my own preferred strategy at this time. I don’t have the same get out of jail free card as you do.”

“You would do similar. Cruel deception.”

“I don’t have fellow inmates to use as corpses.”

“No, you have injured guards to pose as.”

“Hm.”

Will peaks an eye open to see Hannibal’s knowing smile before looking away.

“You had every opportunity tonight, yet here you are,” Will says.

“Staying here has brought me good company.”

“Just like Edmond.”

“Just so.”

Will sighs and stares up at the tall ceiling, where light blurs his eyes.

He listens to the guards for a couple of minutes. Their whispers are difficult to hear but he knows it’s a mix of anxiety over being penalized and confusion over Will’s actions. He can’t blame them. His and Hannibal’s camaraderie doesn’t make his situation look very empathetic.

He pushes off of the wall and turns his back on Hannibal to find some space. Walking through the cell gives him a flash of dizziness, and he has the unnerving feeling that he’s walking in the exact footsteps and manner that Hannibal does daily.

Faux gold plated drawers surround the room, a fireplace of empty space, a ceiling that his ladder would barely reach. 

Drawings are propped up on a couple of scattered displays, on which Will can recognize most of the buildings and landscapes by now. Hidden behind are partially obscured drawings of limbs, and he decides it isn’t worth it to see if he'll find a mirror below. It’s much better to stay ignorant when it would hurt him either way. 

The bookshelf is recognizable. After slowly scanning across, Will can see that it is organized in the same way it once was. A piece of before, even if insignificant, and missing many notable titles. He walks alongside it and reads the few covers that he hasn’t seen before.

He doesn’t go near the bed or toilet. He remembers his own, the lingering feeling of eyes and insecurity, the visceral discomfort. He doesn’t want to look at where Hannibal rests his head. A glance at the creases on his pillow and Will would feel it on his cheek.

That’s where the corpses are, anyway, blood reaching the underside of the bed. Shredded skin. Flesh that must be missing. Those that will haunt this space just how Hannibal likes it.

Compact and bared and simple. The room makes him _itch._

He feels the heat of Hannibal’s shoulder when he comes to stand near him, staring at the bookshelf. If they keep their voices low, they might be close enough to talk without the microphones picking it up. Will's chest clenches up, and he can’t say anything at all. They’ve been this close in his mind palace, but even there he can’t quite feel the heat against his shoulder.

“You must appreciate some of the humour,” Hannibal says, leaning in slightly. 

“You find amusement in everything.”

“Imagine Jack and Alana’s faces receiving that phone call.” His teeth pop out again with his smile, red-tinted, sharp.

“The talking-to I get won’t be funny.”

“Maybe not for you.”

“You make everything a lot harder for me.”

“I only want what’s best for you.”

Will sighs. “I know you do.”

They stand in silence for a few minutes. Will’s shoulders relax, his nose grows used to the smell. Hannibal, surprisingly, doesn’t bother him with mind games. Just how it used to be, silence stretching out but without the discomfort Will encountered with other people. It was always words that cut into his skin or nothing with Hannibal. 

When he steals a glance, Hannibal looks to be content to stand at Will’s shoulder for a while.

Will knows that they won’t have much longer together before a plan is in motion and he has to leave, one way or another, no matter how difficult Hannibal makes it. 

Still, nothing comes to his mouth, nothing of the million thoughts that file through in constant, overlapping succession. 

Mostly he’s grateful that there isn’t a fork digging around in his brain. But another part of him knows that he’s ventured too deep into Hannibal’s space again. He should have pressed up against the door, refused to speak. He’s already grown fond of the dangerous comfort, and no matter what, it’s going to hurt to leave more than it has the last few days. What he keeps carefully buried is tapping at his skull with or without Hannibal’s help.

He will continue to visit Hannibal for the Red Dragon case. It shouldn’t be something that gives a slice of comfort, something that tempts him so much. That the secret pleasure of talking to Hannibal can’t be hidden from himself, let alone everyone else who sees him turn up here. 

The hole was filled for a while. He swears it was. Things felt genuinely fine on his wedding day, the cusps of laughter at every spoken word, the faces of pride. He didn’t need Molly to understand him inside and out because they kept trying and because it felt easy to do so. He shouldn’t have come here at all, but the tendrils of temptation snuck around his torso.

It shouldn’t be so addicting to find someone who understands him so well it cuts him from rib to groin. He rubs at his eyes and wishes for something stronger, something to distract him from the presence that expands at his side.

“Pretend you’re on the other side of the glass. Pretend it’s like simpler times. Tell me about our shy boy, what you came here for,” Hannibal says. By the tone, Will knows his minor mental breakdown has been caught without a second glance.

Will’s folders are spread across the floor on the other side of the glass. His hands are so empty.

“He’s killing the pets,” Will mumbles.

“He is watching and waiting.”

“Tomorrow I’m going to the properties again, going to look around for places he might have been watching from.”

“You brought me nothing. Why did you come tonight?”

“Perhaps he started out by killing pets as a child—”

“You don’t feign idiocy very well.”

Will glares at him.

“Is it that the night haunts you too much? What do you see in the space that bears down its darkness?”

“You know what I see.”

“Do you miss your wife?” Hannibal asks suddenly.

“Seriously? A chance to talk candidly, and that’s what you ask me?” Will snaps. He turns his back and walks toward the opposite corner of the room. There’s nowhere to go. When he reaches the wall, he turns and finds Hannibal has followed close behind. 

“Do you still have all of your dogs?” Hannibal asks. 

“A fan of small talk, are you now?” He quips.

“What I really want to ask is what your life looks like now. Paint me a picture.”

Will gulps back and turns to face him. It’s difficult to look away from the blood. Some has splashed up against Hannibal’s forehead, speckling his short hair. His heart beats louder.

“These days? Nightmares in a tiny motel room, greasy takeout, and zoning out in meetings while young FBI’s try to be heroes from behind their desks.”

“The days before, were they a comfort, or did they blend into nothingness? Do you miss her voice in your ear?”

“We talk.”

“What was the wedding like?”  
  
“Hannibal…”

“Small. Outside?”

“We have to talk about this? Now of all times? This vanity of yours is growing old fast,” Will says. 

“This isn’t the time or the place for other conversations,” Hannibal says.

“You really think there’s going to be another time or place than this for us?”

“There always is. Why else would you find me again and again?”

“I think this is more like a hostage situation.”

“That’s what they’ll assume, yes. And for the best,” Hannibal says. 

“What, lest they assume I’m just moving in?”

“Perhaps it will help your case of innocence if I treat you like a real hostage. If you’d like, I could pin you down?” Hannibal grins.

Will stares at him exasperatedly and shakes his head. He’s careful to keep his eyes steady and unseeing. Hannibal can’t know the way he can ruin him. Can’t know that the second those words came out of his mouth, Will became doomed to the image in his dreams. It was a mistake to come here. 

It doesn’t appear on his face, not here where the cameras exist in every corner. He doesn't know what Hannibal can see anymore.

“If you don’t like my questions, then you’re allowed to ask me some,” Hannibal says.

“Questions such as what your days look like?” 

“Well, I do have that schedule down to the minute, funnily enough.”

Will hesitates for only a moment. “And the days in your mind?”

“I wander.”

“Not too deep?”

“Have I fallen through the holes in my mind, you mean to ask?”

Will nods, keeps his lips pressed together.

“I see a deer. I follow the deer, against my best interests.”

Will feels a chill wisp across the back of his neck. “A deer?”

“Nothing but a memory. A memory I once tried to collect, and now that stays in my mind with no option but to live with it. I wake up, and I return, just as you do, seeing the edges of darkness coiled to the side, but a tunnel of beauty ahead nonetheless, no matter how far it goes.”

Words don’t come to Will’s mouth. He blinks silently.

“Don’t worry about me, Will. There is no need to step in front of the bullets that won’t kill me, unless you truly wish to be my keeper.”

“Were you going to leave before I got here?”

“No.” 

“You could have. Why? Why are you in here?”

“Don’t waste our time asking questions you know the answer to.”

“Don’t waste our time trying to ruin the image of my wife in my head.”

“What can we fill the space with then? Here, where the sand goes still.”

“It’s not still, not by any means. It’s pebbles, and they’re spilling fast. They’re going to be here soon. What will you do then?” Will hears the rain of stones on the hard floor.

“What will you do? Return to your tiny motel room, eat greasy takeout, and pretend to be zoned out while you silently assess everything that goes on at your FBI meetings. Do you even care to catch this shy boy we’ve been discussing? Are you even trying when you turn up here with the same handful of files as the day before? When you come here to look at me, when you come here to scan your eyes across my living space and imagine each breath I take at night, are you truly comforted by your wife’s voice within your skull afterward? You don’t deceive me here. Tell me, Will, don’t you wish you could stay for a while longer?”

Will is quiet. He isn’t entirely sure that he can hear a crowd of people moving close, but he can sure feel it. Can feel the entire building shaking and straining, dust coming down from the ceiling with the stampede. Pieces of himself fall to the ground. They’re on the wrong side. He won’t be able to come and pick these up later.

Unobstructed by a barrier, by space, by the distance he’s built up tooth and nail, he sinks into Hannibal’s eyes. A dangerous game to be captured by them while Hannibal tells him the things he doesn’t want to hear.

Will clears his throat, wishes he could cough up whatever is perched inside his ribs. He’s been silent for far too long. He can hear the footsteps.

“Zoe died,” he chokes out. “I have the rest of the dogs and a few more added to the pack.”

“Zoe was quite the ugly girl.”

“She was,” Will agrees, his lips stretching into a bitter smile. Tears blur his eyes against his will until all he can see is the smear of red on Hannibal’s chin. That old feeling is back, the one that feels like a string tied to his gut is being pulled up his throat in the direction of Hannibal, dragging all his organs with it. 

His old friends are here, and he can’t stay much longer. It’s too soon. Did he and Hannibal really stand in this very spot for that long? Was the silent contentment truly spanning minutes upon minutes? It felt like a flash of light when compared to all the time in his life he’s spent feeling so alone. In those few seconds he let go, and he’d completely forgotten there was another side of the wall.

“It was a good life there,” Will says, his tone going higher when he tries to say it in a way he can believe.

Hannibal observes him with a tilted head.

“Don’t follow the deer. You can’t stop it. There are better things to follow,” Will whispers.

“Hannibal!” Despite himself, Will winces at Alana’s voice. Out of the corner of his eyes, he can see the swarm of backup officers filing in. He can practically feel Jack’s eyes boring into his without looking.

“Let Will out and don’t touch him. Perhaps you can keep your toilet. If that’s not persuasive enough, expect to be shot. You have sixty seconds,” she says, voice urgent.

Hannibal raises his eyebrows at Will. The amusement doesn’t quite reach Hannibal’s eyes.

“You’ve got to let me go now,” Will chokes out.

Will can barely stand the mournful look on Hannibal’s face, but he stares anyway. Hannibal holds his gaze for a long, charged moment before he turns to Alana.

“I will cooperate, of course,” Hannibal says. “You can send them in.”

The sound of the lock clicking fills the room. Will turns his head to look but doesn’t make it before Hannibal is grabbing either side of his neck and yanking him back, thumbs upon his cheeks. A slick and warm grasp, firm and more than enough to ground him back into what they’ve shared here tonight.

“You must know it isn’t walls or locks or guns that keep me in here, Will. And if I am let out, it isn’t jewels, diamonds, or gems that I will cherish.”

An excessive number of guards surround them and yell at Hannibal to put his hands out. He lets go of Will’s face, and with it goes all of Will’s breath.

Someone tugs him back by his shoulders, but Will stays planted right where he is, twisting out of the grip. He watches the guards secure the mask over Hannibal’s bloody face, and his arms are forced into a new straitjacket. The guards are rough, closing his arms in and Hannibal twitches. Will has the dumbest urge to tell the guards to stop and barely keeps it in as Hannibal is manhandled into position.

“Perhaps sometime we can visit on the other side. A place with a nice view,” Hannibal says, and Will can see his smile behind the mask, just as he can see the tears moistening his eyes. Will watches him get maced in the face in the next second, and Hannibal is wincing, squeezing his eyes shut so he won’t be able to see Will walk away. Will has no doubt that instruction was whispered from Alana.

Will is yanked so hard that he can’t fight it and goes half stumbling out of Hannibal’s cell with guards on either side of him. 

“What on earth happened, Will?” Jack demands, gripping his arm as soon as Will steps past the barrier to his side of the world again. Will turns away from his gaze. Multiple people crowd the room, eyes straining to get a look at him. He wonders how long they’ve been there, how long he got lost in that cell.

He chances a glance at Alana. Her hair hanging loose and face clear, nightwear and an oversized jacket. She looks more like a person he used to know. Curious but concerned glance and all. He looks away before she can see what he can’t let anyone see.

Will gets the hands off of him and treks toward the door. His chin turns by itself to see Hannibal strapped and swarmed and crying expressionlessly one last time. Suddenly he hates each person attached to the hands that grab at Hannibal, hates them with a burning rage. He practically runs out of the room.

He pumps his legs, determined to get away from it all. While each subsequent door tries to lock and keep him in, he keeps pushing through with all his strength, needing the fresh air on his face again. Footsteps are behind him and that’s always a bad omen, isn’t it? Someone always trying to trap him where they are.

“Will!”

He almost reaches the front entrance and escapes into the night but Jack catches up to his shoulder and stops him.

“Will! Slow down. He didn’t hurt you?” 

“No.” He walks a bit slower.

“I need to hear everything that went down tonight, and we’ll need a formal statement,” Jack says.

“I know.”

“Call your wife before it gets on the tabloids.”

“I know.” 

He tries to turn and leave, his hand on the handle to freedom, but Jack grabs him again.

“Will, stop.” 

“ _What?_ ” he snaps.

Jack’s eyes flick down and up again, and he raises his eyebrows. Will follows his gaze.

Standing out in stark contrast on his dress shirt are dark bloodstains, staining his sides in the unmistakable shape of Hannibal’s hands around his ribs. Dragging him back into the cell, fingertips just reaching the sides of his stomach. A possessive, bloody embrace.

It’s not etched into his skin, and it doesn’t have to be. He doesn’t know if it’s worse that it burns him or worse that he wants it to. Yet again, Will feels those hands wrap around him as though Hannibal were standing right behind him, pulling. 

“Here,” Jack mutters, pulling off his jacket and helping Will cover up the evidence of how he’s been marked tonight. It falls loose over Will’s frame. Pity is in Jack’s eyes, something equal parts protective and wary. Will opts for staring into space and tries to ignore the blood flooding the hallway behind him, closer and closer to covering him completely. He won’t get out the front door before it’s submerged his head.

Jack scrubs uselessly at his cheeks and neck where Will cannot see but can feel all the same those bloody handprints squeezing with a lingering tenderness.

**Author's Note:**

> i appreciate any feedback and if anyone wants to share on tumblr or come chat you can do that [here](https://will-gayham.tumblr.com/post/638260608763150336/tenderest-touch-leaves-the-darkest-of-marks)! ❤️
> 
> I have also posted a sequel, which you can find as the next work in this series!


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